Sutton Hoo Ship Burial

The Sutton Hoo Ship Burial is one of the greatest treasures ever found in England. Over 1,300 years old, it sheds light on the myths and legends during the period that followed the collapse of the Roman Empire.

The Sutton Hoo Ship Burial was discovered in Suffolk, East Anglia, and is the site of two 6th and 7th Century cemeteries. One of the burial mounds contained a massive and significant ship burial.

The Sutton Hoo Ship burial was found to include a wonderful treasure of gold and silver, including Anglo-Saxon artifacts of outstanding historical beauty and historical, archaeological significance.

Sutton Hoo is the name of an area along the River Deben opposite the harbor of the small Suffolk town of Woodbridge, about 7 miles (11 km) from the North Sea.

It was an entry point into East Anglia during the early medieval period following the end of the Roman imperial rule in the 5th century.

The treasures discovered in the burial ship included beautiful craftsmanship pieces from England, Germany, Scandinavia, Alexandria, and Byzantium.

The masterpieces include a gold Buckle Belt decorated with writhing animal patterns, a pair of Shoulder Clasps inlaid with garnets, a Purse Lid made of gold and garnets, and a Helmet.

The Sutton Hoo Ship Treasure

1939 excavation of Sutton Hoo with the image of the buried ship

Sutton Hoo Helmet

One of the discovered artifacts was a rusted helmet had been crushed in the decay of the collapsed wooden burial ship.

The Helmet had to be painstakingly reassembled over many years, back into its original form.

The Sutton Hoo Helmet is extraordinary. It is composed of a world of dragons and monsters. Look for the wings of the dragon in the eyebrows, the shape and the body of the dragon is in the nose with the whiskers are the tail.

Initially, the Helmet was crushed into over 5,000 fragments when the burial chamber collapsed many years ago. It took many attempts over many years to reconstruct the Helmet to what we see today.

Today it is easy to imagine the face of an Anglo-Saxon leader in this reconstructed Helmet, staring out at us from over a thousand years ago.

The Sutton Hoo Ship Burial is of great importance to early medieval historians. It represents a period of English history that is not well covered by historical documents.

This site dates to when early rulers of the East Angles held power and played a part in the establishment of Christian rulership in England.

The person buried in the ship was a mighty and wealthy person during the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of East Anglia to have been offered such a lavish burial. A burial site remained untouched by grave robbers, and people forgot the significance of the mounds amongst the farming communities.

Discovering the Sutton Hoo Ship Burial

The discovery of the Sutton Hoo Ship Burial was all due to a remarkable woman, Mrs. Edith Pretty (1883-1942), who, in 1938, decided to investigate the soil barrows covered with grass on her property.

Mrs. Pretty used some spare labor on her estate and the help of a local archaeologist call Basil Brown (1988 – 1977) to start excavations with oversight by the Ipswich Museum.

The Great Buckle from the Sutton Hoo Ship Burial

In May 1939, while excavating the tallest of the barrows, which was nearly three meters high, Basil Brown uncovered the bows of the ship. As the potential importance became evident, scholars from Cambridge joined the dig in July 1939.

The British Museum also joined to support the efforts as Europe moved towards World War II.

The discovered treasure was over 1,300 years old, and the ownership of the uncovered treasures was not clear.

Under the law of 1939, a Coroner’s Inquest was required to decide whether the Sutton Hoo discoveries where a ‘treasure trove’ and thus belonged to the government.

The jury at the Inquest found that the hoard was not a treasure trove and was, therefore, the property of Mrs. Pretty.

Mrs. Pretty could have sold it and become very rich; instead, she decided to present all the treasure to the nation, to be housed in the British Museum. Mrs. Pretty refused to accept any honor or recompense.

Nine days after the excavators left the site, Britain entered the War. The “ghost” of the ship in the soil was covered over, and soon after, British tanks were practicing war-time military maneuvers on Mrs. Pretty’s property.

The treasure was buried again in a disused section of the London Underground. It lay deep below London until after World War II when it could safely be exhibited at the British Museum for the first time in the late 1940s.